Forget Dapper Laughs, there's a new seedy pick-up artist on the (misogynistic) block. American Julien Blanc and his RSD (Real Social Dynamics) gang travel the world educating men how to go about getting women, and spreading the word via seminars whereby he instructs guys to choke girls. Yes, really. 'As long as it's genuine fun, you can choke the girl. That's usually my go to,' he informed his rapt audience before promptly getting booted out of Australia for being a raging dickhead. 'If I go and choke if she like tenses up, I'm like, 'ha ha it's sexy! Ha ha, yeah, look it's like Star Wars, you're supposed to walk into it? How can you get mad about someone who says it's like Star Wars? You can't.'
Now he's planning on bringing his, erm, niche (read: misogynistic) brand of education, and city worker Caroline Charles has decided to take a stand. Last week she started up a Change.org petition with the aim of making the UK revoke his visa, as they had done in Austraila. 'I was sitting on the sofa with my husband on Saturday, reading Twitter and starting ranting about him, then realised I could stop being angry and do something proactive,' she told The Debrief. 'I checked and there wasn't a UK-focused petition – he'd been kicked out of Australia and Canada was getting its act together, so I thought we should too.'
Turns out, it wasn't just her who felt strongly about this - the reaction has been astonishing, as of today, it's already got over 60,000 signatures, and not just among women. 'I'm very heartened by how many men are signing,' she says. 'It's easy, when surrounded by media dealing with Chris Brown, Dapper Laughs, Robin Thicke and now Julien Blanc, to get caught up in feeling there are no longer men who are allies. That's never been true, but it's been wonderful to see it evidenced by the support pouring in from men who've signed. Julien Blanc and his ilk does them a massive disservice with his posturing.'
Despite the support, there's a darker side to speaking out against pick-up artists like Julien. In fact Caroline Charles is not Caroline's real name, and she's felt it necessary to take a pseudonym 'to avoid the kind of backlash suffered by other women who've spoken out about this kind of thing'. It's unsurprising, considering the amount of shit people who spoke out about Dapper Laughs got served via social media. 'Women who dare to speak out - who refuse to 'know their place' - are systematically abused,' she says. 'Ask Caroline Criado-Perez, Stella Creasy, Zoe Quinn or Brianna Wu. Even to the extent of having personal details - home addresses - posted online. It's frightening and entirely backwards.'
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Thankfully, the signatures are continuing to grow as we start to spread the word that no, it's not OK. Jennifer Li from the US has also started the petition #TakeDownJulienBlanc where she calls for the removal of his online tutorials - and it's already got nearly 50,000 signatures too. Seems like seminars where men recount how they walk through Tokyo grabbing girls' heads, shoving them in their crotch and yelling 'Pikachu' isn't something we'll stand for. 'Women everywhere deal constantly with everything from low-grade everyday sexism to physical assault and are told in turns to 'ignore it' , 'don't overreact', 'are you sure you didn't do something to provoke him'? So I decided I'd had enough.'
But can the UK actually ban him from entering? A spokesperson for the Home Office has released a statement: 'All visa applications are considered on their individual merits in line with the immigration rules. The Home Secretary has the power to exclude an individual if she considers that his or her presence in the UK is not conducive to the public good.'
Okay so that's pretty vague, but the fact that over 60,000 UK citizens strongly believe he's not conducive to the public good has to count for something right? Fingers crossed.
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.